Q&A with the authors of Anti-Bias Education

An NAEYC Online Event

The influence of media and the effects of globalization challenge those of us who care for and educate young children to develop and sustain learning environments that are inclusive, nurturing, and tolerant. Decades of work and research by educators, activists, and social scientists have validated the need to create classrooms where we teach and live the ideals of equality and justice. This online event was hosted by Louise Derman-Sparks and Julie Olsen Edwards, author-educators in the vanguard of such work. The authors share:

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It is important to remember that it is not human differences that undermine children’s development but rather unfair, hurtful treatment based upon those differences.

Early childhood teachers want each child in their care to feel powerful and competent. They strive to welcome every child and to show respect to each family as best they know how. However, beyond individual teachers’ hopes, beliefs, and actions is a society that has built advantage and disadvantage into our many institutions and systems.

Inequity of resources in society, and the biases we use to justify that inequity, have an enormous impact on children’s lives. The dynamics of advantage and disadvantage, deeply rooted in our history, continue to shape the degree of access children have to education, medical care, security . . . in a word, to the elements necessary for children’s healthy development. These dynamics also greatly affect the early childhood education system, despite whatever values individual teachers may have.

Given the continuing societal inequities into which children are born, anti-bias education raises the following questions for early childhood educators:

How does living in a highly diverse and inequitable (unjust) society affect children’s development?

What do children in a diverse but inequitable society need to grow up healthy and strong?

What do early childhood educators (and families) need in order to respond to this challenge?

Our bookAnti-Bias Education for Young Children and Ourselves looks at these questions and provides a set of strategies for teachers who want to see themselves as champions for all children and their families.

Learning to be an effective anti-bias educator is a journey. Wherever you begin, there are always new paths to explore and knowledge to acquire. We’ve been doing this work for more than 40 years and there’s always something new we trip over and need to learn.

Please send us your questions about your own journey and your work with children, families, or other teachers. The more specific your questions, the better the dialogue can be. We look forward to this conversation.

— Louise Derman-Sparks and Julie Olsen Edwards

Comments

I work in a military program that has families from all over, but still lacks a diverse prospective. I would be interested in any ideas to help families understanding celbrating life and our differences without necessarily celbrating every Hallmark Holiday.

We try to explore all things that are curent and relevent to the children, but in an early childhood tis is often a gray area. Any suggestion swould be great.

If you have a diverse group of families ashen learning about each child’s family, then exploring the simirlatiies and difference among families, and among the children should supply you with all the material you need. if you create materials based on the families and children (see making materials in chapter 4), and integrate material about the families and children in your daily curriculum, then you will be able to implement key objectives of anti-bias education: making every child visible, learning about how we are all the same and different, learning about how all families care for and love their children, although in different ways. If you focus on learning about each other’s family’s holidays, and celebrating with each other, you will get away from what you describe as the “Hallmark approach”. (I have attached the principles of using holidays in an anti-bias approach below my response). If you create a culture where children learn to care for and cooperate with each other, across all of their diversity and learn how to handle any unfair behaviors based on their identities , then you will implement additional key objectives of anti-bias education. As to the second part of your question regarding ‘current issues”, I am not sure what you mean. If you like, please write again and tell me more about your question. One thought is for you to look at Diane Levin’s book: Teaching Young Children in Violent Times: Building a Peaceable Classroom, (2003).
Here are a few guidelines for using holidays, adapted from the ABE book chapter 11... The issue is not “do you or don’t you include holidays in your curriculum”, it is how do you address anti-bias principles as you think about holidays.

There is a difference between learning about and celebrating a holiday
Celebrating a holiday engages children in holiday activities as full-fledged participants, as if they accepted the holiday’s underlying purpose and meaning in the way those who regularly celebrate it do. Celebrating a holiday is only appropriate in faith-based programs or programs in which the holiday is really part of every family’s belief system. Even then, it is essential to recognize that within the belief system different families celebrate in different ways.
In contrast, learning about a holiday means teaching children about what the holiday means to the cultural/religious groups who honor it, and the various ways they choose to celebrate it. With preschool age chidden, the focus is on how the different families in the group (or the community) choose to celebrate specific holidays.

Teaching about a holiday calls on teachers to communicate accurate information, appropriate to the child’s level of cognitive development, in a clear and matter-of-fact manner. It also requires that teachers make very clear that we can enjoy learning about each other’s holidays without having to participate in ideas and rituals that are not ours. Teachers may read a book to children or design learning experiences about the holiday. Activities can include individual children and family members sharing what it is they do during a holiday and why.

Holidays are not universal.
All cultures commemorate significant occasions in some fashion. Holidays reflect the history, religious beliefs, cultural values, and traditions of specific cultural groups. In addition, even within a group that celebrates the same holidays, the way a particular holiday is celebrated may well vary. The beliefs and traditions of one group or family may conflict with or complement those of others. Knowing the origin and underlying premises of a holiday will help you to make decisions about what role, if any, you want that holiday to play in your program. (Did you know that in the United States Mother’s Day started as an anti-war holiday?) Knowing the meaning of the traditions will help you decide how you want to use it and what key ideas you want to pass on to the children.

Every holiday tradition deserves respect.
Respecting cultural diversity means recognizing that everyone has the right to his or her beliefs and traditions, including holidays. It is hurtful to children and families to disrespect that diversity in early childhood programs by imposing the holidays of one group on all the children and staff; by making the holiday traditions of some groups visible while others’ are invisible; or by denigrating or denying anyone the right to believe in or to celebrate his or her tradition in their home. This is why it is so vital that you make choices thoughtfully and respectfully about whether and how to make visible the holiday traditions of the families in your program, recognizing that no family’s traditions should be disrespected. It is also why we advocate the principle of inviting children to learn about other children’s holidays, rather than asking them to celebrate the holidays in the classroom.

Holidays have deep emotional meaning for the people who celebrate them.
We first learn our holiday traditions from our family as young children—leaving us deeply imprinted by all of their smells, tastes, sights, sounds, and interactions among family members and friends. Some of these emotional memories may be deeply wonderful or strongly unpleasant. Fueled by commercial and media hype, so much expectation is built up around holidays that many children (and adults, too) can feel disappointment if their holiday experience is not the way they think it’s “supposed” to be. Adults may try to “make up” for their own childhood holiday disappointments with the children in their lives now. For families with religious affiliations, how holy days are expressed and celebrated have especially deep and powerful meaning. (Some families deliberately select a faith-based school so their child will learn the particulars of how they want their holidays practiced.)
All these strong emotions can make holiday curriculum choices complicated. Most families—and many staff—want their particular holidays to be recognized in the program, and often want the holidays done the same way they do them at home. Not marking a holiday or doing it very differently can result in a person feeling disrespected or robbed of something important to them. Sensitive, thoughtful, and unhurried development of a holiday policy and activities, which includes all staff and input from families, helps to address everyone’s feelings (see below).

Each family has their own version of holiday traditions, including not celebrating.
Don’t make assumptions about any family’s holiday traditions. Even when families celebrate the same holiday, each may celebrate it with different symbols and activities. In addition, the same holiday may carry significantly different meanings. Respectfully ask each family what holidays they celebrate and how.
If you do choose to teach about holiday activities, use what you learn from the families in your planning. Remember, however, the answers will likely change from year to year as new families enter your program and old ones leave. Be very cautious in incorporating published information and commercial holiday materials; your curriculum should always accurately reflect your particular families’ individual traditions.

Changing how a program does holiday activities requires thoughtfulness, sensitivity, and patience.
Coming to understand what a holiday means to you, your colleagues, and families will help you work with others to figure out mutually satisfactory solutions. Some people will find changes to a particular holiday celebration difficult, as this Head Start teacher attempting an anti-bias approach related,
Changing how I do Christmas was hard for me, because Christmas was and is a big thing in my life. It was hard for me to step back and realize that what I was doing in my class was for me. But I do not want to hurt any of my children, so I did accept that I had to make some changes.
Others will be delighted, as one Muslim preschool teacher was. She described how liberating it felt when her child care center changed its traditional Christmas celebration to one where each family and teacher shared his or her personal holiday story and tradition with the group.

SORRY FOR THE ERROR IN THE FIRST SENTENCE. It should read:If you have a diverse group of families , then learning about each child’s family by exploring the simirlatiies and difference among them , and among the children themselves, should supply you with all the material you need.

First of all, thanks for the great book!
I think it will be great if this book is read not only by teachers but also by parents. Then, together we can make fairer educational environment for young children where the diversity of students can contributes to healthy and fruitful classroom atmosphere.
And this book is well organized so that whenever I encountered a question to want to ask, soon I met a refutation for that question I had in the following paragraphs. Besides, the examples introdeced in the book were practical enough to take into the real classroom.
However, there is a question that I still have. It is desirable to make anti-bias education for young children and ourselves under the situation that "we are all the same; we are all different." For example, if there are children who speak different language at home, then this book suggests to encourage group meetings or activities among students who share the same language. I think this is a good idea to help student to feel comfortable with their school life. On the other hand, I'm concerned about that if this kind of approach may lead students to socialized only with peers who share the same culture, and make another problem. Do you have any idea about it?

I'm so glad the book was useful for you. Many classroom teachers contributed ideas and practical applications.
Your question about same-language groups is an important one. The idea is not to segregate children based on language, but to provide times in the school day when their home language is being honored, supported and developed. During other parts of the day it is important that children be in mixed groups and be supported in developing friendships across cultural lines.
English language learners do not live in a world that is neutral about language. They are surrounded with messages that their family language is not "good enough", is incorrect, is shameful. Their learning is deeply compromised when they do not have the language to connect with experiences and feelings. It is important is that we provide an environment where the language of their parents and grandparents is respected and nurtured along with English.We don't have to chose between supporting children to have strong English skills and supporting them to true bilingualism. Most children in the world grow up bi or multi-lingual. Our can too.

As a former prekindergarten teacher, I always tell my undergrads about how teachers must stay constantly aware of their bias toward the opposite sex student. As a male teacher, I inadvertently gravitated toward teaching the girls in my class (due to their tendency to talk more than the boys) until a colleague brought this to my attention. Otherwise, I am not sure I would have every known about it.

What would you suggest as a possible way for teachers to assess themselves in order to identify any bias that he/she might possess toward teaching students of the opposite sex?

How lucky you were to have colleagues who observed carefully and talked with you about what they saw. It is always hard to see our own behavior, and even harder to sort out what is a preference (for example I'm always drawn to children who sing to themselves!) and what reflects a bias (I have a hard time with children who are always focused on new possessions). Either way, we have to learn to be open to all children and to work with each one respectfully and warmly.
It helps to have colleagues who are also interested in seeing their own biases and who are open to working together to unlearn them. You might want to take the "Stop & Think" questions from the chapter on Gender Identity, and use them at a staff meeting as a means of developing awareness. Perhaps you and at least one other colleague could take on a challenge such as: "See how long you can go without mentioning a girl child's appearance"; "Count the number of times you acknowledge kindness and thoughtfulness in a boy child". Then discuss what you find out. (You'll probably be surprised).
It is as important to understand your responses to children of the same sex as yourself as it is to understanding those of the opposite sex.

Hi Louise and Julie,
I have been teaching in the field for around thirty years. the original ABC really influenced my disposition as an educator and continues to influence the way I interact in the world. I have two questions for you. first, what motivated you to revise the first book, was there anything you felt needed rethinking? my second question is, What do you feel are our biggest challenges and opportunities for the next twenty years? What do we need to confront?

Hi Brian,
Several issues motivated us to revise the first book. Over the years teachers talked to me (Louise) about the need for discussion of additional issues. These included: supporting children and families with same-sex parents, addressing economic class as it affects young children, and ways to carry out anti-bias education in family child care settings. In addition, the chapter on t culture focused only on how to teach children about the simirlatiies sand differences in each other’s cultures, but did don’t address creating culturally relevant programs that also support children’s home cultures and home languages. Finally, it seemed important to add discussion about supporting Arab American children and countering misinformation and stereotypes about Arab Americans. I also wanted to reflect the range of voices and anti-bias education experiences of educators around the country. Therefore, I interviewed many people, whose stories appear throughout the book. Finally, to add even more voices, I invited several experts in particular areas of early childhood diversity and equity work to write short pieces, which appear as “Voices from the Field”
Now to your second questions: “What do you feel are our biggest challenges and opportunities for the next twenty years? What do we need to confront?” : I think we have finally established the essential ideas that home cultures and the prejudices and discrimination in the larger society deeply affect children’s development and that early childhood programs must address these realities. The biggest challenge now facing us to put these basic premises into daily practice in our ECE organizations and programs- with children, staff, families and teachers-in-training. Part of this challenge is recognizing that diversity and equity are about multiple aspects of identity , such as gender roles, sexual orientation and family structures, economic class, and differing abilities/ disabilities, as well as racial identity , ethnicity and culture , language. Two contradictory beliefs widespread in our society these days poses us with one of dynamics we have to confront. One is the belief that multicultural and anti-bias education is obsolete because we are now a post-racial/ post-prejudiced society. The other is the reality of growing overt forms of bigotry, especially directed at people of color, immigrants and lesbian/gay/transgender/bisexual people.

There are many positive things that come up during the holiday season – giving, showing appreciation, celebrating and enjoying each other. But it’s difficult to plan something inclusive that celebrates the “spirit of the season” so to speak when the “spirit of the season” is in fact coming from one dominant culture. Interested in your ideas and advisement on this – for teachers working with young children and their families. Thank you.

I am assuming you are talking about the Nov/Dec/Jan period. On the one hand, the values you mention, as well as ones such as building community, honoring the right to be free to follow ones’ beliefs and to work for a world of peace and sister/brotherhood are all ones that underlie holidays that take place during this time. On the other hand, there are contradictions to those values. The dominant culture holidays of Thanksgiving and Christmas generate mixed feelings for many people, (e.g., people who do not share in the religious beliefs of Christmas or for whom the historic underpinnings of Thanksgiving represent loss and pain). There really is no way to avoid these contradictions. Some teachers choose to ask families to share their holiday traditions during this time, rather than try to attempt an “inclusive “approach. This strategy does give recognition to the families and avoids people feeling that their traditions are being ignored. Other teachers do use an “inclusive” strategy, such as you suggest. If you go this route, you may want to still acknowledge the various holiday names of the families in your program and talk about how all of them share the more inclusive values you want to emphasize. The Holiday chapter (11) in the ABE book discusses these issues in more depth. Also, see the guidelines from that chapter in our response to Donna’s question

Reading this book has helped me uncover and move past many things in my own life. It has helped me be a better role model not only to the children I work with but my own child as well. Thank you. I have learned many good ideas and look forward to using them all!!

We thank you for this lovely feedback. Writing the ABE book, as well as our anti-bias education work with children and teachers over many years has also helped us learn and grow in understanding of ourselves and our lives--and to find our voices in the ECE field. Doing effective anti-bias education calls on us to grow as well as to create opportunities for our children to grow. We are so glad that our book helped you to do this.

I absolutely agree that we should teach children to treat everyone with respect and try not to hurt their feelings. But why, for example, should that mean a child can't bring treats to class just for her friends, without having to bring a treat for everyone that is a policy in my program? Don't we have an obligation to prepare children for the real world?

I'm not sure what you mean by "the real world". Do you mean that unfairness and unkindness exists and that children are sure to experience it? If so, I agree - but I don't think that means we have to sanction unkind behavior. Generosity, thoughtfulness and yes, sharing, also exist in the real world, and part of our responsibility to children is to teach them those skills and attitudes.
I'm more troubled by the fact that your school has a policy, but that the reasons for that policy aren't clear for those of you working with the children. This would be an excellent topic for you to raise at a staff meeting and encourage a discussion of what you all, as a collaborative group of professionals, want for children, and how you want to teach those values.
Remember that a children's program is shared space, common ground, community for the little ones. And teaching them how to live respectfully and kindly in a community is an important survival skill for the real world.

Thanks so much for your work – bringing all of us to new levels of understanding. What an important gift it is for each of our children – a true respect and appreciation for themselves and all others, and an ability to really celebrate our uniqueness, similarities, and differences!

What is the way to deal with a 5 years old boy who is already showing prejudice towards the African-American children? He doesn’t even want to appear in pictures together with them. Since this is obviously a learned behavior for him, how would you suggest teaching him that this is wrong. What is the way to overcome family culture in situations like that?

Paying attention to this situation is the beginning step towards solving it. However, yours is a difficult question to answer without more information about it. In a situation such as this, my first step is to learn more about the child to whom you refer (let’s call him Sam), by observing and documenting and, sitting down with him privately to explore his ideas and feelings. What are the various ways that Sam shows that he learned prejudice towards African American children? Is it behavior directed at a particular child or at all the African American children in the class? Is the African American child the only one of his background in the class? Does he only play with children from the same racial/ethnic background as his? Find some private, comfortable time with Sam, and try to explore why he thinks and feels as he does. Also, find out if other staff see prejudiced behaviors and in what circumstances.
Step 2, after you gathered as much data as you can about Sam’s behavior, ideas and feelings within a one-week period is to talk with Sam’s family. Go to pages 35-36 and 39-42 in the ABE book for guidelines about how to talk with family members about the situation. Bring an open mind and heart to the conversation with them. You seem to believe that Sam is learning his prejudice from his family ,but do you know this for sure? Sometimes children in a family that does not teach prejudice still develop negative feelings and behaviors.
Step 3 is to assess your own learning environment and curriculum, as well as how other children in your class interact with the African American child or children. Is your environment rich in diversity? What is the racial/ethnic background of your staff? Do you have many learning materials: posters, books, puzzles, dolls, skin-toned paints and colors , that depict the range of African American families and people? Do you have on-going, frequent activities that provide children with direct experiences to explore and appreciate how they are the same and different from each other? Do you make visible all of the children and their families in your environment and curriculum? Do you cultivate a culture of fairness and respect and teach children ways to build respectful, cooperative relationships with each other? Do you also teach children how to handle incidents of teasing or rejection based on any aspect of their identity?
In sum, handling a situation as you describe about Sam is a multi-strategy task. Once you have the information from the previous three steps, you will be ready to formulate both a short and long-term plan to work with Sam. Check the section in the ABE book about working with a child who shows a pattern of discomfort or bias through his behavior to help you create you plan. Involve other staff and Sam’s family to the extent possible. Read or reread chapter 6 in the ABE book to help you. Keep in mind that it may take several strategies and activities, as well as time for you to help Sam overcome his negative feelings and behaviors.

Good for you for recognizing that the world is inequitable and that this child may well face bias as she grows up. There are many things you can do to support this family and to help prepare them for the years ahead. First, it's important that you are clear that the challenge is society's homophobia, not the family itself. All the research shows us that Gay families do as good of a job of raising children as any other family. Second you can develop a curriculum about families "We all have families, our families are different" which helps all the children develop positive language for talking about family structure. You can be sure that the books, pictures, materials and vocabulary used in your program is inclusive of all families. You can get to know the Dads - and if they are not connected to support groups in the community, and if they are interested, you can help them make those connections so they have on-going support. And you can help this little girl be proud of her family and clear about her own ability to stand up for herself in any situation.
What fun! How wonderful she will have you as an ally in being a strong, sure, person.

One problem you may encounter is that preschool age children often aren't even aware that you can have two moms or two dads. A good way to help them understand and develop a positive attitude towards these families is to add a few books to your classroom library that depict them. NAEYC's website had an article that features a list of books that are great for this purpose.
Put the following url into your adress bar and it'll take you right to it:

Also, it would be great to have a day where everyone shares about their family. That way, the students in your class can see that everybody's family is different. Have them draw pictures, bring special items for show and tell, even have "family day" where the parents come in and have lunch with the kids.

I really admire your determination to make this family feel accepted and I wish you the very best of luck :)

Ms. Derman-Sparks: I just wanted to make a comment - I am a toddler/twos teacher in a local center, and am also close to a friend of yours, Pastor Susan Ruehle (she has been my pastor/mentor for many years!)! She has shared some of your work with me; I look forward to reading your book.

Thank you for letting me know. Sue has been a wonderful colleague in anti-racism wore for many years and I treasure the relationship. I look forward to hearing your thoughts about the ABE book after you read it.

I teach in a small school of almost all white, upper class preschoolers who have little exposure to minorities in their daily lives or in their school. We touch on multiculturalism throughout the year through stories and music; we discuss bias relating to Martin Luther King Day. I would welcome suggestions that you might have or websites that could be helpful to make this a more prominent part of our program, as it is going to be so important in the lives of these children in the coming years. Thanks. Sue (NJ)

Your question is one that many teachers working with predominately white groups of children have raised over the years. As a result I co-authored a book with Patricia Ramsey titled, What if all the kids are ‘white? , published day Teachers College Press. We are in the process of updating the book, and the 2nd edition will be available in April, 2011. I refer you to the book for a more complete discussion.
The basic principle is to begin exploring diversify and fairness with whatever group of children you have in your program. White children have many differences among them—gender roles, family structures economic class, abilities/disabilities, looks, interests, and so forth. Explore with he children the same and different form each other and promote their learning the very basic ideas that 1) differences are a normal and enriching part of everyone’s life and 2) that each of us is both the same and different from others. In addition create a daily culture of fairness, where children build caring , respectful, , cooperative relationships with each other rand where teasing and rejection based on who a classmate is—their appearance, or family, or amount of possession or clothes, or needing to wear glasses or use a wheelchair -- is never acceptable. These are daily activities.
Once you have built these basic ideas of diversity and fairness into your daily learning environment, and activities, you have created the foundation for helping the children explore similarities and differences, as well as connection and fairness , in relation to racial and cultural groups other than their own. First learn what the children are thinking and feeling about people from various racial/cultural groups. Even if they do not have exposure to real people, they DO have exposure to images and messages through TV, movies, parental/family attitudes, and other children. These messages influence their ideas about others even without direct contact. The ABE and What if all the kids are White? books suggest ways to learn what your children think. Next, introduce a variety of activities that help children learn about how they are the same and different from people in raical/cultural groups other than their own, counter misinformation and stereotypes they may hold about people in other groups, and to develop a sense of fairness toward others beyond their own experience. The ABE book has many suggestions for doing this. . You can use children’s books, persona dolls, regular visits from guests, music. Make exploring diversity beyond the classroom a regular part of your daily environment and curriculum, not just an occasional or one-time activity.